Midnight
by Tony Stark's Hidden Side
Summary: He should have blasted the man's head off the moment he opened the door... but it was like looking in a mirror. A cracked and broken mirror, but a mirror. Now nobody is answering their phones, leaving the two unlikely allies to fight against the forces of Hydra and struggle to find a safe place. T for swearing and grenades.
1. Chapter 1

He came in the middle of the night, when only Stark was awake - as usual, he didn't sleep much these days anyway. Jarvis alerted him. "Sir, there is a man at the door. Preliminary facial recognition suggests a 60% match with the Winter Soldier."

"What?" He grabbed his wristbands. "Suit. Now." He ran down the hall toward the door, his suit catching up with him on the way.

Bucky was pacing outside the door, unarmed - literally, his mechanical arm was in his hands. When the door opened, they just stared at each other for a minute.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Stark's face, under the suit, was a mask of shock. "Are you suicidal?" He winced at the texture of the word in his mouth.

The man shrugged. "I knew I wasn't going to last much longer out there. I thought at least if someone was going to kill me it should be someone with a legitimate claim."

Words left his mouth before he thought about them. For a brief instant, he didn't see the Winter Soldier, he saw himself. "Come in." He stepped back and held open the door.

They sat in silence for a while as Tony made coffee and wondered just what in the hell he thought he was doing, anyway. This was starting to remind him of a day when he had woken up to find Clint walking around his room, finding and throwing away his razors and pills.

"So." He sat down and handed over a mug of coffee. "What made you do this? Were you attacked, is that why your arm is off?"

Bucky nodded. "Broke it, didn't know how to fix it, figured I was done for."

"So… you decided as long as you were going to die, you wanted to pick the way to do it." At another nod, Stark remembered a bomb heading for Manhattan and a one-way trip. "I did that one time. Lived, obviously, but… I know where you're coming from."

"I've been hunted since… since Washington." He sighed. "Hydra is the worst of it, but there are a lot of people who either want to get the Soldier back or to kill him."

"Get him back, huh?" Stark frowned, hard. "What happens if they manage it?"

Bucky groaned, a sudden sound of agony as he buried his head in his hands. "I don't know. Maybe they could brainwash me again, maybe not. That's really why I'm here - I want to die before they can make me into a weapon." He looked up with grieving, terrified eyes that were all too familiar. "I don't want to hurt you guys anymore."

Suddenly he was crying.

Stark was completely confused. Bucky Barnes? Crying? He seemed more like the get-drunk-start-a-fight type. Then he thought about it.

Honestly, it was surprising it had taken him this long to break down. He'd been brainwashed, fought his best friend, killed while trapped in his own mind…

"Come here." Tony grabbed a blanket and tossed it around Bucky's shoulders. "I'm going to text Steve, all right? Will you still stay here while we wait for him?"

The man just stared, tears still falling down his face. Finally, he nodded, before burying his face in the blanket.


	2. Chapter 2

Steve Rogers could _not_ believe he was supposed to sit back and "wait for word." His best friend was missing, chased across the world by Hydra and who knew how many other groups… _again._ It had been his job to make sure Bucky stayed safely in cryostasis until they could find a way to deprogram him. He had failed.

Like hell he was just going to sit around and _wait._ He grabbed his shield for the hundredth time, made for the door, sighed, and sat back down. He didn't have the faintest clue where to even _start_ looking for a man who was honestly way too good at hiding from him.

" _We promise,"_ Clint had assured him, " _the instant we find something, anything, we'll let you know. Zero lag time."_ He would have been comforted if he hadn't known that the chance of anyone finding Bucky were lower than the chances of Bhutan winning the World Cup. Was that a correct cultural reference? He couldn't really be bothered to care.

Until his friends found something (" _No, I'm sorry, Steve, having an easily recognizable supersoldier along will not help us at all, we're trying to spy, just… be patient, okay?"_ ) all he could do was pace. And honestly, pacing was not one of his favorite things to do.

Back when he was with the Howling Commandos, he had been asked (ordered) just three times to sit on his ass and wait for word. All three times, he had disobeyed those orders, and had been glad he did. Twice, his team had disobeyed that order for him, and he had been glad they did that, too, or he would be dead by now.

This time, he was following orders, and he had a sinking feeling he and Bucky were both going to pay for it.

His phone buzzed.

There was a moment when he thought his heart was going to stop, followed instantly by a moment of tense confusion, because that wasn't the right phone.

That was Tony's phone.

He hadn't warned Tony about what was going on. Was there a chance someone already got their hands on the Winter Soldier, and Stark found out? Was this how everything came crashing down? The little black flip phone, the twin of the one in New York, showed _one new message_ , and Steve suspected it was one new message he didn't want to see.

So, he didn't. He waited tensely for word on Bucky, and he shoved that stupid black phone into the bottom of his duffel bag (already packed, waiting for when someone finally came up with some information). He didn't want to answer Tony's questions, couldn't risk Tony finding Bucky.

So he just didn't open the phone.


	3. Chapter 3

He so was not going to fall asleep tonight. Not with the Winter Soldier in his kitchen and nobody _answering their damn phone!_

Tony sent three texts and called twice before he gave up. Apparently Steve was in major trouble or else had lost the phone. Hopefully he'd check his messages when he recovered the phone again.

 _There's another option, of course,_ commented the little voice in the back of his head that definitely was not his conscience. _He could have decided whatever you wanted to say wasn't that important, or read it and decided you couldn't be trusted, so he didn't respond._

He tried to shove that part of his thinking down deep into a dark corner of his brain. Steve Rogers would never ignore him on purpose. He tried to steady his breathing (the _Winter Soldier_ was in his kitchen and even one-armed he was a _deadly assassin_ ) and figure out what do without Captain America's help.

Okay, what did he know? Well, first of all, he knew he had let potentially the second most deadly person in the world right through his front door (he would never back down from assuming Natasha was #1, the _looks_ that woman could throw ought to count as deadly weapons). He knew said assassin's arm was currently off (he didn't know if it could be reattached). And he knew his defense systems were functioning. That was important.

There was no way he was going to get any sleep tonight.

"Well, I left him a message," he said, taking a seat across from the blanket-wrapped man ( _assassin,_ his mind corrected automatically). "I mean, who knows where in the world he is, literally, but he'll call back soon, I'm sure." _You are literally harboring a fugitive, Stark, what the hell are you doing?_ That little voice? It was getting louder. A lot louder. _Maybe if you shoot him right now you can still escape with your life._ And it was also getting violent.

Bucky wasn't answering to anything he said. His eyes were closed and he was practically slumped over the table. _He's playing dead,_ the little voice supplied, _trying to catch you off-guard so he can strangle you with his one good hand and take your head back to Rogers as a trophy-_

"All right, that is _enough_ out of you," he muttered aloud. "Paranoia is _not_ a good look on you. On me. Oh, whatever. Jarvis?" he called to the ceiling.

"Yes, sir." The AI sounded concerned but not urgent.

"Will you do me a favor and lock down this floor? Don't let anyone up." He spoke quietly, in case the Winter Soldier really was feigning sleep. "And conference call Clint and Natasha, will you?" If he couldn't talk to Steve, he was at least going to talk to _someone_.

Their phones rang until the answering machines clicked in. He left a simple, _It's Tony, it's urgent, it's about Bucky, call me back,_ and started to pace.

One of his friends not answering his phone? A coincidence. Two? Well, depending on the two, still probably nothing. But the two master assassins and the super soldier all out of contact meant one thing and one thing only: mission. Mission that required no cell phones. Secret mission.

"Jarvis, call, um." He sat at the opposite end of the table from the (probably) sleeping soldier and hesitated. He had a very limited list of people he trusted, and of those people, he couldn't tell Rhodes or Pepper about the Winter Soldier being in his kitchen unless he wanted the army to come in, guns blazing.

Of course, the little voice in his head decided to pipe up again. _That's the best idea you've had all night, dumbass. Are you trying to get yourself killed? Suicide by murderer?_

"Jarvis, just… keep trying those three numbers, every hour until you get a response." He groaned and started pacing, trying to keep it quiet. "Until then, alert me of any move Barnes makes, keep this floor off-limits to anyone including security - tell them I'm working and there can't be any distractions. And, uh… if I die, please shoot him."

"Sir, are you sure this is a good idea?" _Now_ the AI was starting to sound really anxious. "There must be someone you can call for backup in such an urgent situation."

Something told Tony that Jarvis wasn't actually worried about Bucky killing Tony, but about the pacing, the talking to himself… "No, J, there isn't anyone."

Stupid, how the people he fully trusted now numbered exactly one: himself.

Stupid, and his own fault, he supposed. He was the one who kept being an ass and alienating everyone around him, and somehow when he trusted someone, it was always the wrong person. _Well, you've certainly been stabbing in the back enough,_ the little voice said again. It hadn't been this noisy in a long time. Not since his arc reactor had been torn from his-

His chest tightened. His breathing started to get faster. He shoved himself from the table and took refuge in the next room. Only Jarvis's voice cut through the impending panic attack. "Sir, are you _sure_ there isn't anyone else you can call?"

"Pretty sure, J." He was starting to miss the _old_ Jarvis, the pre-Vision one. This Jarvis was a backup from old files and had missed quite a bit, including his PTSD and the weeks of learning how to handle it. The old Jarvis somehow always knew what to say.

"Sir, I must inform you that-"

"Mute, Jarvis." He was too tired for this, and he couldn't get enough breath into his lungs. Somehow he had ended up in a corner of the room, the room wasn't a room anymore though, it was too dark to be a room, this was space itself, and he was alone with no power and falling back to Earth too slowly and the explosion was going to catch up and tear his suit apart and he was going to die alone halfway across the galaxy from a goddamn nuclear explosion and an _alien army and why the hell were there aliens this was just getting too weird and oh god he could feel the arc reactor shutting down completely and he was dying right there in space._

A persistent voice (not coming from inside his own head this time) kept repeating words directly in his ear. "Breathe steadily, you're getting enough air, I promise. You're going to be all right as soon as you breathe steadily. Just focus. Breathe steadily, you're getting plenty of air."

The voice insisted that he count backwards from one hundred, so just to piss whoever it was off, he started counting upwards from seventy-one. It wasn't until he reached three hundred twenty-six that he realized he was no longer in space, he was back in the hallways outside the kitchen, and all the lights were on, _way_ too bright. "Oh, god, Jarvis, can we get like half of these lights off? Please? Before I sear my eyes out?" He focused for a few minutes on getting his breathing under control.

Then his mind registered the voice directly in his ear, and he turned around to find James Barnes's face about four inches from his own.

"Jesus fucking-" he jerked backward, nearly bashing his head on the wall. Then he realized that, a) Bucky wasn't making any sudden moves, and b) apparently he had just talked Tony out of a serious panic attack. "Where'd you learn that trick?"

"I was in World War II, remember?" Bucky shrugged. "We had different names for shit back then, but we all knew what to do when someone was hyperventilating in a corner."

He nodded slowly. The little voice in his head was still screaming bloody murder (literally screaming bloody murder, seeing as it wanted the Winter Soldier to die as soon as humanly possible), but it was a little quieter, a little easier to ignore. "This has just been a really shit day."

"Yeah, ditto." They were about a foot away from each other now, still crouching in the darkest corner of the room. Well, Bucky was crouching. Tony was just kind of collapsed against the wall. To his surprise, Bucky actually smirked. "I think my day was more shit."

"Oh, it is so on… actually, wait." He glanced at the severed metal arm on his kitchen table. "I think I have to give you this one." The smug smile on Bucky's face was out of place but reassuring. It was human.

Maybe he would be all right to fall asleep tonight after all.


	4. Chapter 4

Okay, well, he didn't sleep. It was just too difficult to close your eyes when you know there is an assassin in your guest room, not matter how polite and well-intentioned said assassin had been so far. And when you added in the fact that _nobody was answering their damned phones_ , well, Tony was getting a little frustrated.

At the same time, though, Bucky was getting more and more nervous. He kept glancing out whatever windows he could find, routinely stopping and tilting his head to listen to every sound around him, and just generally acting paranoid.

Which was when Tony Stark learned the first rule of being on the run: you aren't paranoid if someone is actually chasing you.

They came out of the air vents, and honestly, Tony should have been expecting it. How many times had Clint popped out of the vents and scared the hell out of him? And yet, since he knew the archer _needed_ that little quiet space all to himself, he had never gotten around to upgrading the security inside.

Which, as it turned out, hadn't been the smartest move, because now Hydra agents were practically pouring out of the vents and into the floor above Tony's. He was really glad he had put a lockdown on his own floor, even if it had been because he was paranoid about someone coming in and finding Bucky there.

It was Jarvis who alerted them of "unknown personnel in the ventilation system on floor nineteen," which had caused Bucky to instantly snap to something vaguely resembling pure focus. "They appear to be attempting to cut through the ceiling."

"All right. Deploy any and all countermeasures," Tony instructed. If the knockout gas didn't stop them, he knew the electrical shocks would. At least, he _hoped_ the electrical shocks would.

"My apologies, sir. They appear to have cut the wires powering those subsystems while they were still in the ventilation." That's another thing he missed about the old Jarvis: usually, the old Jarvis would have said that Hydra had disabled the interior defenses _first_.

All right, problem number one: Bucky looked about ready to murder someone. No, wait, that was problem number _two._ Problem number one was that bloodthirsty mad scientist employees who were skilled enough to break into his Tower were coming through the ceiling. _Priorites, Tony: Hydra is the immediate threat._ "Barnes, we are about to have a whole lot of fun."

"I really, really hate your definition of _fun_ ," the soldier muttered.

Tony grabbed a set of tracking wristbands from on top of a cupboard full of glassware. "Jarvis, send the suit to my bands." He considered the one-armed (but probably deadly) Winter Soldier and evaluated his options: shove him in a closet somewhere, set him against the worst Hydra had to offer barehanded, or he could do something _really_ stupid and give him a _gun_.

His self-preservation instincts were practically fighting each other. On the one hand, Barnes was absolutely not to be trusted (he was pretty sure…) and on the other hand, Hydra was coming. Through. His. Ceiling.

"Ah, fuck it." He could practically hear Steve over the comms muttering " _language"_ and chose to ignore him as he realized Hydra would get there before his suit would. He glanced at Barnes one more time and raced for the pantry. Below the flour (and peanut butter and six boxes of Poptarts from when Thor was staying over) there was one shelf devoted to weapons. Three handguns, two tasers, and a grenade tucked in the back somewhere. It wasn't paranoia, he reflected, if someone was actually chasing you. "Barnes, I'm going to need you to cover me until the suit comes through the window. Might take a minute or two."

"Cover you with _what_ \- oh." He blinked in astonishment but decided not to question why the inventor kept weapons under the cans of tomato sauce. This was, after all, the home of a member of the Avengers. Bucky immediately picked up a loaded handgun (because sometimes there just isn't _time_ to find bullets, dammit) and stuck another in his belt.

That was the moment Hydra soldier started pouring into the room. "And, I have officially decided, neither of us is paranoid," Tony muttered.


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N - Did you know that this story was supposed to be a oneshot? I realized I kind of left it on a cliffhanger and decided to try and explain why Steve didn't respond and then I just fell in love with writing this.**

Natasha and Clint were in a bit of trouble. "A bit of trouble" being that they weren't actually finding any trace of Barnes anywhere they looked. Well, actually, one might reasonably assume the "bit of trouble" was the fact that they were in an abandoned warehouse with no security, blown covers, and twelve Hydra soldiers with guns out and pointed at them.

But that wasn't "a bit of trouble" for them, that was Tuesday.

"I still say," Clint commented as he ducked under a stream of bullets while putting an arrow directly in one soldier's skull, "that Barnes must have gone west to Illinois."

"Who the hell would go to _Illinois_ if they were being chased by Hydra agents? I mean, sure, it's the middle of nowhere," Natasha paused for a second to trip one particularly annoying enemy right into another's face, "but he needs someone to fix that arm, if you were right about it being torn off in Virginia."

Clint loosed an explosive arrow at a Hydra helicopter starting to descend toward the area. "I'm telling you those metal parts were from his arm. Either he died there and someone did too good a job hiding the body, or that arm got detached and he picked it up and ran."

"All right, genius," Natasha stabbed the last soldier through the heart and sighed, "where did he _go,_ then? You'd think someone would have _noticed_ a one-armed guy wandering around."

The archer nodded thoughtfully as he left an incendiary arrow to burn through the warehouse (and the pile of bodies they couldn't be bothered to hide). "You would think, but - hear me out, here - what if he put the arm in a bag and wore a blanket? Looked like just another homeless guy, nobody looks twice at them."

Natasha snorted. "They probably do in _Illinois._ He went to a major metropolitan area, I'd swear by it. Trying to find a prosthetics expert for that arm."

"He's on the _run,_ he doesn't have time to find someone for the damn arm!" Clint bickered as they headed for their car and swapped the license plate out for a fresh one. "The guy has been running scared for how long, now? A month and a half?"

"Seven weeks," the assassin replied calmly, wiping her face. "Do I have blood on the back of my shirt? And he knows he won't survive one-armed, there's no way he would have just carried it around with him or dropped it in a dumpster. He needs the arm on or he's dead in three days, tops."

Clint hesitated. "Well, all right, I'll buy it. Your shirt is clean, how's mine? We'll start looking at prosthetics designers... no. No, that's too obvious, Hydra would be swarming those places in an hour, wouldn't they."

"Maybe somewhere Hydra wouldn't think to look... oh, big stain on that jacket, swap it out. Eventually Barnes is going to decide he can't do this on his own, you know. Got any word from him?"

"Nah, that explosion two states back busted my phone." He sighed. "New one, too, latest edition Starkphone. Tricked it out to disable all the GPS shit and everything, took me three hours."

"I have twelve missed calls, but they're all from Stark. Speak of the devil," she chuckled mirthlessly, and slipped the phone back into his pocket. "Probably screaming at me for ever letting Barnes out of my sight, or demanding that I tell him everything we know so he can go on a revenge quest."

Clint's brow furrowed. "He's not _that_ bad. Maybe we should see what he wants?"

"Ha, no, I cannot deal with that tonight. We've run into so many dead ends that honestly if one more thing gets on my nerves I am going to snap." She sighed. "Look, maybe in the morning, okay? Assuming nothing blows up in our faces by then."

"Never assume," muttered the archer, and hopping into the driver's seat.


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N - Writing this story is slowly consuming my life. There are 2 more chapters ready to post and I'm starting to think this is going to become a *long* one...**

The sheer amount of redecorating Tony was going to have to do to cover this up was giving him a headache already. Bullets tearing into the wallpaper, the shag carpet, the linoleum in the kitchen, breaking picture frames and ruining his furniture. This was going to be hard to explain to the cleaning staff.

There was also to small fact that his life was in danger and the only thing protecting him was the Winter Soldier with a borrowed handgun. A borrowed handgun that he had to hand to Tony to reload as he drew the spare from his belt. Admittedly, though, the guy was a _fantastic_ shot.

On the other hand, evenutally the Hydra soldiers would remember he was only one-handed and decide to just rush him.

Tony was going to slap himself later for jinxing that, he really was, because no sooner had he completed the thought than one of the leaders barked out an order in Russian and they were swarming forward, still shooting, making for the cover behind which the rather terrified genius and the cold-eyed assasin crouched.

"Uh, plan?" Tony blurted, looking automatically to Bucky. He was _really_ used to Steve being in that position, dammit, and instinctively checked in. "Never mind."

"No, a plan would be great right about now..." Bucky glanced to the pantry. "You, uh, have a grenade or something in there?" He watched the genius's face light up and smiled in return.

Then he handed over both guns and simply said, "Cover me." Tony barely had enough time to realize someone was depending on his dubious marksmanship for protection, and then Bucky was darting out of cover to head for the pantry, and Tony had to poke his head up and shoot.

 _Well, the suit doesn't aim itself,_ he reassured himself, despite the fact that he wasn't nearly as good a shot as Barnes, he had two guns at once. That had to count for something.

On the other hand, the Hydra soldiers weren't stopping, and they'd be on him in a matter of seconds. The suit would be right behind them, of course, but they were going to reach him first. And they were still aiming at Bucky, who had only the pantry door for cover. He tried to aim, but his hands were shaking, and a few of them were turning to him now. Wait, which was he supposed to shoot for? _Cover me,_ Bucky had said, so that was what Tony did. He winced when a bullet kicked up marble on the counter right next to one of his hands, but he concentrated on the soldiers aiming at Bucky.

"Down!" The shout was expected, but it was sooner than Tony had predicted. Bucky must have found the grenades damn fast.

That wasn't Bucky yelling.

He just had time to recognize the metal ball landing next to his foot and decide it was a really stupidly ironic way to go, to have a Hydra squad execute his own plan before he could. He closed his eyes and threw his hands across his face, as if that was going to help _anything._

"Mother _fuckers!_ " Bucky's voice was disturbingly close, causing Tony to open his eyes reflexively just in time to see the sniper toss the grenade right back over the counter they were using for cover. _Why didn't I think of that? Oh, right... panic reaction..._ he tried to aim a grin at his companion, but Bucky was pulling him down, covering the inventor's body with his own, and _oh, right, that grenade is still going to go off in about-_

"Defensive casing initiated," said the cool voice of his AI, and his suit burst through the window in a red and gold blur. Instead of assembling around Tony, the pieces slammed down around both of them, providing what limited cover they could for two people. _I changed my mind, I love the new Jarvis too._

Then the grenade went off, the counter, the Hydra agents, and the defensive casing all blew apart, Tony felt something sharp in his arm, and the world exploded into dust and noise.


	7. Chapter 7

Dust filled the room, making him cough until his eyes watered. Talking or, really, even breathing easily was out of the question. Between the dust and the heavy weight on his chest, he was effectively breathless.

 _Hold up._ That weight on his chest had a name. He managed to cough out enough of the dust and smoke to choke out, "Bucky?"

There was no response except for the scrambling of what few Hydra agents remained. They had to be taken down, and fast, and Tony really was in no condition to fight. He had no suit, no weapon unless he made the mad dash to the pantry, and no particular skill with a handgun.

Then again, he also apparently had a man down (down meaning right on top of him), and he wasn't exactly going to let that go. He rolled Bucky off him and, eyes tearing up from the dust in the air, scrambling for whatever weapon lay closest to hand. As it turned out, the gun in Bucky's belt had managed to survive the blast ( _don't look at the blood on his face, just take the gun_ ) and he aimed with shaking hands at the first shadow to move in the dust, then the next.

A few times, bullets flew past and embedded themselves in the kitchen cupboards, but Tony was crouched behind what was left of the dishwasher and hard to see, much less hit, in all the chaos. Something was on fire, and Jarvis was delaying the sprinkler systems because he knew the smoke was playing to Tony's advantage. _I love this AI._ Bucky was pretty safe, his body ( _don't say body_ ) tucked between the remains of the dishwasher and a mostly intact section of counter. That area wasn't on fire yet, and the enemy didn't have a line of sight. It was as close to safe as there was in a situation as dire as the one they were in.

Tony, on the other hand, wasn't anywhere _near_ out of the line of fire. He had the best cover he could find, but since he needed a line of sight to anyone approaching… well, it worked both ways. Jarvis tried to give him directions to any heat signatures he detected, but there was only so much the AI could do with so many of his connections to the floor severed either by Hydra or by the explosion. "J, make a note," he muttered. "Find out who the hell made their grenades, and either burn down their factories or buy like five hundred for Clint." One of the Hydra agents apparently emptied a whole clip in the direction of his voice (he had _thought_ he was being quiet), and one bullet grazed his left arm. He bit back a hiss of pain and fired back.

"Two degrees to the left, sir," Jarvis informed him, and he adjusted his aim before his opponent could move. A cry informed him that his shot had been accurate. He loved this AI. "I believe that was the last one, sir." He _really_ loved this AI.

"Sure hope so," he said between coughs. The sprinklers finally came on, and he crawled the few feet between him and Bucky. He didn't think he was injured too badly, but it was better to stay low in the smoke, and his ankle felt like it was on fire (he had checked: it wasn't _actually_ on fire, so at least there was that). Bucky was definitely out cold, which probably had something to do with the fact that his back was chewed up with pieces of metal and marble. " _Shit!_ Jarvis, call - oh. Right. Wanted fugitive. Uh, Jarvis, are there any doctors in this entire building?"

The AI sounded honestly concerned. "Sir, there are no licensed medical professionals in Stark Tower. The hospital is only three blocks-"

"No hospitals," he responded immediately. If he walked into a hospital with the Winter Soldier, or called an ambulance or any sort of emergency service whatsoever, it was the same as condemning Bucky to the death penalty. On the other hand, if he did nothing, well, it wasn't going to be pretty. Which left exactly one option, and he didn't exactly like it. "Right. Jarvis, you're going to have to get me as much information about what to do for this kind of wounds as you can."

"Sir, Sergeant Barnes will require at least seventeen stitches, I think it would be best to call an actually doc-"

"Seventeen stitches? Right, okay, got it. I should probably try to clean the wounds out first, though, right? Fuck, which cabinet are the dishtowels in?" He interrupted the suggestion to call a doctor immediately. Now that he had evaluated his options, he was going to stick to the decision he had made. "Jarvis, you're going to help me with this, right?"

The quiet reassurance, "Of course, sir," was as welcome as it was expected. This was absolutely a bad idea, but it was the best of the bad ideas, because any other choice meant death for Bucky. "You'll need to boil water."

"Well, it's a good thing I'm in a partially destroyed kitchen, isn't it?" he muttered, and got to work.

 **In which, if you notice, Tony has completely stopped calling Bucky by his last name...**


	8. Chapter 8

Clint was starting to think they were in trouble.

They had been following Bucky's trail for days, and someone had obviously noticed, because everywhere they stepped there was an ambush waiting for them. Hydra was apparently pretty intent on getting rid of the assassins on their tail, and they had come pretty damned close a couple of times. "Are you hurt?" he panted out as soon as they were back in their car.

"Not bad," Natasha hissed in response, which had definitely not been the answer he was looking for. "Bastards grazed me, that's all. You drive." She was already grabbing one of her spare shirts and tying it around her bleeding leg.

"You're sure you're all right?" It was a useless question, since there wasn't really anything he could do but drive. "I'm going to call Steve, tell him we can't risk following the trail directly any longer. We're pulling out."

He knew she would shake her head before she did it. "We can't leave Hydra chasing the Winter Soldier around the world, dammit! You know what might happen if they get their hands on him!" She sighed and wiped her bloodstained hands on her shirt. "We can't let this trail run cold."

"It's already cold," he responded, and caught the flash of understanding in her eyes.

"You think they're the ones leading us on," she breathed, tossing him a bottle of water and checking behind them for suspicious cars. "You think they're laying this trail."

Clint sighed. He wanted to find Bucky as much as she did, he knew how dangerous it was to have someone that dangerous at the mercy of Hydra, he _knew_ what could happen if the Winter Soldier took control again. At the same time, though… "If it were me, I would have started laying a false trail as soon as I noticed someone was following me. We lost the trail back in Virginia, and we both know it. It's time to cut our losses and stop walking into traps."

"We did lose the trail in Virginia," Natasha admitted. "Maybe we can go back there, and find it again?"

Her face showed the chances of that idea succeeding, but Clint felt like he had to shoot down what little hope she had, and do it quickly before they got themselves killed for nothing. "They'll have wiped out the original trail, too. You know you would have done the same thing. They're leading us on a wild goose ch-"

The car hit something hard and unyielding, something that had loomed up out of the darkness with no warning. The windshield shattered immediately as their car and the black van that had cut them off careened off the road. Clint heard Natasha calmly call out for him to cover his face, and as he did he felt metal shards dig into his hands. _Shit. Fuck and shit._ Hydra had found them somehow. The trap they had been walking into since Virginia was snapping shut, now they just had to try to survive it.

The car rolled, something slammed into Clint's head, and all thoughts of false trails and the Winter Soldier were immediately replaced by surprise, pain, and welcome unconsciousness.


	9. Chapter 9

It was dark, and his back hurt. Those were the first two things Bucky noticed as he regained consciousness, and the second was a _lot_ more important than the first. He managed not to start swearing right away. His watchword these days was caution: he needed to figure out where he was first, and then get to a safe place, and _then_ he could start swearing.

The air smelled like smoke and metal and blood. A battlefield, indoors, an explosion, someone was hurt. Judging by the amount of pain and the strength of the smell of blood, he wasn't the only one hurt. He risked cracking his eyes more than a sliver, trying to see in the nearly black room. His sixth sense (and the sound of breathing) told him he wasn't the only one left alive, wherever he was. He'd have to take care of that.

"You awake?" The quiet voice came from less than two feet away, and he nearly jumped out of his skin before automatically reaching for his hidden gun. Except, not only was the gun not there, but his arm didn't move. _Wait - oh, shit._ His arm was _gone._ "Bucky? Are you awake?"

Everything came rushing back at once. Losing his arm in Virginia, the dangerous trip to New York City, posing as a homeless man in a dirty blanket and big baggy raincoat, trying to disguise the fact that he had only one arm as well as the fact that he was a wanted criminal. Unsure of where to go, knowing he wouldn't make it much farther, he had decided to choose his own way to die, and he sure as hell wasn't going down to Hydra.

Stark. He went to Stark, knowing the man had a vendetta against him, knowing his death would be quick and relatively painless and that the news would get back to Steve, knowing his friends would get closure because Stark would never leave them hanging, wondering if he was still alive somewhere. Showing up in the middle of the night with his arm still in his hand, nearly in tears, wondering if Steve would ever forgive him for giving up.

" _I thought at least if someone was going to kill me it should be someone with a legitimate claim."_ Trying to meet Stark's eyes with something at least close to courage. Failing miserably. Waiting for death, and instead seeing the inventor step backwards and hold the door open.

"Okay, you're definitely awake. Do you know where you are?" His wide eyes hadn't gone unnoticed, but now he could place that voice. A voice, obviously conflicted but sounding remarkably determined, that had said simply, " _Come in."_ He couldn't help but let a smile play around his lips for a second.

"Hydra?" He remembered scrounging in the pantry for a grenade that Tony assured him was there, he remembered hearing the shout of " _Down!"_ and knowing someone else had thought of explosives before him, he remembered turning and automatically throwing the sphere of metal and death right back into the group of attackers. The last thing he remembered was hitting the floor, making sure Tony was underneath him, and closing his eyes.

Tony, whose face was barely visible in the low light, was definitely grinning at him. "Dead. No reinforcements in the immediate vicinity and Jarvis has locked down every entrance and exit to the building except the front door. Level Six security drill, we're telling people. Nobody suspects."

"Right. Good. Okay." He didn't bother trying to move, even though he was on his stomach, which wasn't his favorite position. He could mostly only see cushions and Tony's face, and that was only because the inventor was taking pains to stay in his line of sight.

"Of course, I'm majorly pissed off at you," Tony said casually. Bucky's eyebrows rose for a second, then he continued, "I have major trust issues, but you sure aren't making it easy to hate you. First you talk me out of a panic attack, then you throw yourself on top of me when a grenade is about to go off. Didn't Steve warn you that I hate the whole _noble and self-sacrificing_ thing?"

He would have laughed if he wasn't still so on-edge. "Actually, I think he forgot to mention that bit," he admitted. Strangely, they were less than a foot away from each other, and Bucky wasn't tensing up and getting ready to run. Judging by the easy grin on Tony's face, neither was he. "Of course, you have me a little annoyed, too. Who said you were allowed to be understanding and relaxed after I showed up at your door without warning and brought the wrath of Hydra down on your head?"

" _I_ said I was allowed to," the inventor answered calmly and seriously. The grin was gone, replaced with a simple smile. "And the wrath of Hydra? Please. Someday I need to tell you about the time a senator tried to call the Iron Man suit a 'weapon of mass destruction' and sent the army to collect it. Do you know how hard it is to go fifty against one when you _can't actually shoot stuff_?"

"I imagine you found some way to deal with them. Someday, you do need to tell me that story." Less than twenty-four hours ago he was alone and convinced there was no way to survive, no safe place on Earth for him. Now he was talking about _someday._ Talking about _someday_ with a man who used to want to kill him. "What do we do now?"

It was a good question, and he could see by the look on his companion's face that it was one neither of them had an answer to. Tony glanced around the completely destroyed kitchen and explain, "I still can't get Nat or Clint or Steve on the phone. I'm starting to think they don't want to talk to me," he deadpanned, then bit his lip. "Or they're in trouble."

 _Steve. In trouble._ He tried to rise immediately, falling back to the sofa as a bolt of pain lanced across his back. "Shit!"

"Whoa!" Tony's hands on his shoulders, gently keeping him from trying to rise again. "It's not like we can just rush out there, guns blazing. We barely beat these guys in the best-defended building in New York, remember? I'd hate to face them on the streets."

"I _have_ been facing them on the streets," he retorted, "and they nearly killed me. If they're after the others-"

Tony placed a hand over his mouth and Bucky nearly bit it. "Calm down. Please. If the others are in trouble, there's nothing we can do about it until you're healed, and I don't just mean your back. What happens if one of they use those stupid nonsensical trigger words on you?"

Bucky snorted. "Then I go berserk and nearly kill everyone," he admitted. "What are you going to do, lock me in your destroyed kitchen until they come to get me?"

"No, that would be stupid. You're dangerous," Tony didn't even flinch at his glare, "but you're also the best shooter I've seen since Clint Barton. I'm not going to charge out there, repulsors blazing. When you're ready to go, we'll go, and in the meantime I'll approach the problem of your brainwashing in typical Stark fashion."

 _Typical Stark fashion._ "You'll, uh, discover a new element?" He frowned. That didn't seem right. "Create an army of robot suits? Threaten a senator?"

"While all those are very good ideas… and, honestly, just plain fun, I was referring to my way of dealing with problems _not_ related to the arc reactor." He smirked. "Pay a trusted specialist an absurd amount of money and hope to hell he or she can figure it out."

"That'll take a while," Bucky muttered. Steve might be in trouble, he didn't have time to see a therapist or a psychologist or a hypnotist or whatever the hell kind of specialists dealt with brainwashing.

Tony shrugged. "Uh, I was planning on making them work with _our_ timetable, actually."

"You'd take me into the field, knowing that there's a perfectly trained assassin in my head somewhere that would kill you in five seconds?" Bucky raised his eyebrows.

"If the Avengers are in trouble, and considering you just saved my life…" Tony just shrugged again and grinned at him. "I think the appropriate word is, _duh_."


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N - This story has been nagging at me and demanding I work on it, otherwise after my astonishing week of ALL THE STORIES... well, I might have disappeared forever.**

 **But I didn't. Because for some reason Tony and Bucky just won't. get out. of my head.**

 **So, enjoy!**

 **(NOTE: Yeah, I did a five-week timeskip. SUE ME, Bucky had a back wound. Those things don't just disappear, trust me, I know.)**

So it went. It did take an utterly absurd amount of money to hire a team of specialists to work with the Winter Soldier (mostly because he needed to bribe them to keep their mouths shut about it), but he was Tony Stark, so that wasn't much of an issue. The real issue was that, by the time Bucky's back was healed and Tony had a lead on Hydra, nobody was sure about the state of the soldier's mind.

"He still responds to the triggers in high-stress situations, Mister Stark, he really isn't stable enough to be in the field yet."

"Yeah, I know, but I said we'd be going when we found something." He glanced at the Soldier and raised his eyebrows. "I don't mean to be insulting - but do you think you can handle-"

"Yes." Bucky was already flexing his (rebuilt, not reattached) metal arm. "What do you have in the way of weapons around here?"

Tony smirked slightly, gesturing at himself. "Hel _lo_ , billionaire prodigy of the entire weapons industry. Everyone forgets that isn't just limited to bombs." They took his private elevator to one of his no-entry labs (it really was surprising just how many areas of the Tower _nobody_ knew about). "I've been working on some stuff for you. Just take whatever feels good to you."

Honestly? He was flattered when the assassin only spared the barest glance to weapons by other designers before heading straight to the StarkTech section of what Tony dubbed "the Armory" (despite the fact that literally nobody but Bucky had ever needed it).

"This has a button that I don't understand." He was holding up one of Tony's best designs yet, a state-of-the-art sniper rifle with… er, _upgrades._ "Two buttons."

"Blue one initiates collapsed mode. Feel free to hit it and see how small it gets." Nobody but Tony Stark could invent a sniper rifle that collapses to the size of a rather thick tablet. He allowed himself a proud smile at the look of shock in Bucky's eyes. "The red one, well, that switches to incendiary bullets. And the blue one will then switch back to regular."

"Right. This one, then." He scooped up several handguns, more grenades and bullets than Tony thought were strictly necessary (but he wasn't going to argue), and grabbed a duffel bag from next to the door with no questions asked.

Apparently, the idea of an awesomer-than-usual survival bag needed _no_ explanation.

Absentmindedly, Tony wondered if Steve, Clint, or Nat had ever actually checked their messages. He would never know, of course. He had survived the explosion, but his phone, not so much. It was unfortunate that they wouldn't have backup.

"So, I have a question." Bucky slipped into the pilot's seat of the helicopter, and Tony decided not to argue. If he thought he could pilot it better than Tony, he probably _could._

"Shoot, Red October." After receiving only a raised eyebrow, he sighed. "Has _anyone_ started catching you up on pop culture? Anyway, what's your question?"

Quietly settling back in his seat, Bucky waited so long to respond that Tony thought he'd forgotten that they were talking. Finally, though, he asked quietly, "Isn't the whole _weapons_ thing a taboo for you? What's with letting me use them?"

"Okay, _not_ a question I thought about." He hesitated. "Well, first of all, it's not exactly a _taboo_ for me. I told the world I was out of the weapons business, but the Avengers have always been an exception. For instance, the arrows Hawkeye was fighting with were crap, so I upgraded them. And who do you think made those Widow Bites that Natasha uses?"

"All right, that makes sense." A few moments of silence, and then a quiet follow-up. "In that case, why did you let _me-"_

"I don't know." This time, he had been expecting the question, and he knew how to answer it. "Somewhere along the way, you became an Avenger, but I have no idea when that was."

There was a lot he still didn't know. Hell, a lot of his actions didn't make sense, if he was being totally honest. But there was one thing he knew for sure.

"Anyway, you saved my life." He shrugged. "You didn't know my suit would show up just in time, you thought you were taking a _grenade_ for me. I guess you're just as much of a reckless, heroic idiot as the rest of us, huh?"

Bucky snorted and muttered, "Nuclear space portal," under his breath. Tony just snorted and tried to shove aside the images those words brought with them.

"Yeah, we're all idiots. And now, we're flying a helicopter into what is quite possibly an area infested with Hydra, and neither of us are even questioning it."

They _could_ go find Steve, Bucky probably knew where he was. Alternatively, they could trace his trail backward, try to find Hydra's trail that way. But if they did either of those things, they could be followed easily. No, they wanted to be the predator for once, not the prey.

And besides, nobody had picked up for a full night, and that meant one of two things. Either they had been in trouble, which meant they were tangling with Hydra themselves, or literally nobody wanted to talk to Tony, in which case he was _totally_ going to rub it in their faces when he took down some of Hydra's biggest heads all by himself.

Well. Not _all_ by himself.

The little voice was still there, of course. _YOU ARE LITERALLY CHASING A GIANT SECRET EVIL ORGANIZATION WITH THE DEADLY ASSASSIN WHO KILLED YOUR PARENTS! WTF! LISTEN TO ME! THIS IS A_ _ **BAD PLAN!**_

For some reason, even though that voice got a little louder as time went on, it also got a lot easier to ignore. Partly, Tony supposed, because it had been almost five weeks since Bucky had shown up at his door, and the guy hadn't even killed him yet.

And partly just because time was passing, and the more time passed, the more Tony was starting to realize he may have been a bit of an idiot.

 _But just a bit,_ he decided, and made sure all his guns were loaded and his suit was ready to deploy. Just in case.

 **A/N - How many weeks would it take** ** _you_** **to feel comfortable around a formerly brainwashed assassin who had killed your parents?**

 **And also. If you happen to review, please let me know:**

 **How much Clint (or Nat) whump do you want, considering they went missing 5 weeks ago?**


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N - This isn't important but I just am getting frustrated at all my fellow Cap fans constantly reminding me that he could pick up Thor's hammer in the comics so they consider it canon that he can do it in the MCU.**

 **He died in Civil War in the comics, I don't see any of you claiming** ** _that's_** **movie-canon now. You can headcanon it all you want (hell,** ** _I_** **headcanon it for some stories!) but don't tell me it's 100% real "because it happened in this similar Marvel universe."**

 **Rant over. Thanks. Enjoy the chapter.**

Steve Rogers was beginning to regret his decisions. Sure, when Clint and Natasha had stopped checking in (or answering their phones), going after them had _seemed_ like a good idea.

There were, however, several rather important problems with that plan.

Strike One was the fact that literally _nobody_ would know where he went. Wanda and The Vision were meeting clandestinely (right when they were needed, _of course_ ), Scott Lang was sneaking around as a mini-man to visit his daughter, T'Challa was running his country, and honestly he didn't have the faintest clue where Sam had gone. That left just him.

Strike Two was that obviously _something_ was going on that he didn't know about. Natasha and Clint were missing. Tony had called no fewer than seventeen times but then the operator said the phone wasn't available when he finally called back (he really should learn, someday, how to access voicemail). He had no information to go on at this point.

And then, of course, after waiting two weeks with no word, he had gone after the superspies. Tracing their whereabouts from Virginia to the Midwest, whereupon he had quickly realized strikes Three _and_ Four. Strike Three: Natasha and Clint, the two most capable spies he knew, had disappeared without a trace and then he had stupidly blundered into the same area.

Because three strikes just weren't enough, though, he had briefly had a thought that made him realize Strike Four. He was in the United States, which had ratified the Sokovia Accords, meaning that he was a wanted fugitive, _meaning_ that he had literally no access to help if he got into serious trouble.

Which, in short order, he did.

So, yeah, three weeks later, Steve was seriously regretting his decisions. It had taken Hydra only one week to lure him into a trap (compared to the superspy duo's formidable two month record, apparently). One week after _that,_ he had briefly seen Natasha while being dragged down a hallway by some Hydra goons. Luckily, that had been at the perfect time, because he had gotten to see her slip her handcuffs and break two noses before she disappeared.

He would have liked to think she got away, but there had been at least seventeen guards within twenty feet of her. Natasha Romanoff was good, but not _that_ good. At least unarmed.

Given a knife, he suspected she might have managed it.

The fifth week was spent resolutely not letting himself accidentally mention Bucky. Hydra probably knew more about his friend's location than Steve did, but he wasn't about to give them any clues, either. On the bright side, eventually someone would realize three Avengers were missing, they weren't exactly inconspicuous.

Wait, but then what? Steve himself had noticed Natasha and Clint drop off the radar, and look where that trail had led him. Did he seriously think Sam would fare any better? Or T'Challa?

Well. Maybe Lang. The power to shrink to the size of a small bug probably did wonders for one's ability to avoid capture. And Wanda and The Vision, well, who knew how deep their powers ran? And Steve doubted either would be seen without the other for a while yet.

Yeah, eventually someone was going to notice that they were missing. And he would resolutely ignore the fact that when he had seen Natasha, not all that blood had been the enemy's. And he would _not_ worry about why Clint hadn't been there to back him up. And most of all, he would _not_ remember that the last time someone he knew had been captured by Hydra, a hell of a mess had ensued.

Every cloud has a silver lining - or maybe two. Firstly, he hadn't seen Bucky once during his three weeks of captivity. That probably meant he was evading capture and going for a record (and _very_ formidable) three months of running from Hydra. Secondly, he'd definitely heard a couple guard grumbling about a certain metal-plated superhero destroying one of their elite death squads, so bonus points for Tony Stark. It was good to know, having glimpsed the smoke pouring out of Stark Tower on the news, that it hadn't been Bucky.

The fact that an elite Hydra death squad was targeting a hero not even _involved_ in the whole "Bucky thing" worried him a little, of course, but apparently Stark could handle himself. Maybe he should have picked up that phone (but then again, he really didn't want _another_ highly dangerous party hunting down his best friend, so maybe not).

Either way, it sounded like Hydra was rearing its ugly heads as quickly as they could assemble teams and set traps. Hopefully, that would prove to be a fatal mistake, and they would bite off more than they could chew.

And hopefully, that mistake would happen _soon._

* * *

It was getting easier and easier to accidentally fall asleep around trained assassins. Tony rubbed his eyes and tried to stretch, only to remember he was in a helicopter, and he probably shouldn't hit any of those buttons. "How long was-"

"About two hours. We're here - how awake are you?" Two icy blue-gray eyes turned their appraising gaze on him. "I'm well aware of how useless you are without coffee. We're about to storm a Hydra base, I'd rather you didn't start napping during a firefight."

"Aw, you're worried about me," he snarked, but that didn't elicit a roll of the eyes as he had expected, merely a raised eyebrow. "Surprisingly, combat adrenaline works perfectly well for me as a coffee substitute."

Bucky nodded. "Right. I found the layout on your phone… tablet… computer-y thing, I think I've found a good sniper's nest for our external assault, but if you want anything intact from the base we'll have to get inside fast-"

" _Phone-tablet-computer-y thing?"_ He just couldn't let that one go. "That is a Stark Panoramic Awareness Display, or StarkPad, it's the latest in holographic tablets!"

"Right. Tablet thingy. As I was _saying,_ if we take too long getting into the base, they'll have time to destroy all evidence and information. Is there anything you need from inside? I can probably find a way to slip in."

He considered. "All right, here's the way it is. We're trying to take down whole chunks of this organization, and I don't have very many leads. I think we're going to have to try to seize at least a few hard drives or something."

Well, say one thing for strategic planning, it woke him up quickly when he realized there were only two options. They could launch a coordinated assault on the well-defended compound, trying to break through before Hydra could destroy all their information (low chance of getting anything but smoking rubble and shredded papers), or Bucky could sneak in while Tony created a huge distraction.

And what bothered him wasn't even playing bait. It was the idea of sending the assassin into a compound teeming with enemies, lacking any sort of backup or exit strategy.

"It's not that I doubt your intrusion skills," he clarified, "it's that we don't have a lot of information and it's going to be really dangerous. Like, more dangerous than breaking into Gringotts and escaping on a dragon."

A signature Barnes eyeroll. "I understood _that_ reference." He smirked. "But they aren't going to catch me. I'm the best in the business."

Tony snorted. "Until I see hard proof of that claim, I will continue to maintain that Barton and Romanoff are the best in that particular business."

"Oh! He doubts!" Bucky pointed an accusing finger. "Well, one day Romanoff, Barton and I will just have to have a spy-off!"

As much as he hated to admit it, he would watch that. Avidly. Assuming, of course, that he could see any of it.

Mentioning that last thought to Bucky set off one of his insanely contagious laughs. It started more quietly than most people whispered and then grew in volume into a chuckle that would have made most comedians bow automatically. Tony couldn't help but join in.

They sobered up rather quickly as they checked weapons and went over the final plan. "Be careful," Tony said automatically.

"You too. If I don't answer comms for fifteen minutes…" he hesitated. "Assume I'm dead."

"If you don't answer comms for fifteen minutes," he retorted, "I'm coming in after you to fix your comms. Now let's get going already."

 _Two men against a whole Hydra base,_ Tony mused as he flew directly toward the always-armed defenses. And damned if it didn't feel familiar. _I'm way too used to these odds._

Of course, given exactly who those two men were, "these odds" weren't all that bad.


	12. Chapter 12

**A/N - Hey, it's me, the person who is** ** _starting to overly ship this._**

Bucky was entirely unsure what to make of the entire situation. The easy part was that he needed to break into a Hydra base, get information on more Hydra bases, and then he and Tony would damage Hydra until they _finally_ stopped chasing him.

The weird part was the part of that sentence that contained the phrase ' _he and Tony.'_ Because those words, if he had heard them a few months ago, could only be followed by ' _were in a fight to the death again.'_

It wasn't that Bucky minded, because he _didn't._ He hadn't ever had a problem with Tony, he thought the guy was a genius, he wanted to pepper him with questions about his suit and ask him about how Steve had adjusted to the 21st century and admire his new inventions and… damn, he just wanted to do all of it.

The problem, of course, was that eventually this was going to fall apart. Tony would remember that the reason his parents were dead was sitting next to him, fighting alongside him. Even if he didn't remember that, they would eventually find Steve, who would probably start fighting with Tony again. After Steve had endured the disbelief of the entire _world_ to go after Bucky and clear his name, he could never choose Tony over Steve, and that would be the end of that. So, yeah, Bucky _liked_ what was happening… but it couldn't last.

"Barnes, you ready? I'll light them up when you give the word."

For now, though, Tony was absolutely unafraid of working with him, so he'd give 120% while it lasted. "I'm in position. Go ahead."

The weapons fire from the enemy was the usual horrible rat-tat-tat and the tiny gray missives of destruction that flew in swarms toward the Iron Man armor. The fire Tony was returning, however, was all red and gold fire, missiles and explosions and the blue flashes of the repulsors. That suit was a greater masterpiece than all Howard's flying cars and Vita rays.

 _Admire the cool supersuit later - invade Hydra base now._ He slipped in easily during the confusion, and as soon as he stepped into the air-conditioned halls, he had a sudden and horrifying realization.

It could be a trap.

"Tony, I didn't ask," he hissed, keeping his voice as low as he could as he maneuvered through the halls and slipped soundlessly into the air ducts. "Where did you actually get this intel?"

"Don't worry, Bucky. I'd never take a shot in the dark with something this important. It comes straight from the top of rebuilt SHIELD, checked and then double-checked by yours truly."

Surprisingly, instead of abating slightly, his worry nearly vanished… and he doubted very much that it was _SHIELD_ he was trusting. And anyway, on the slim chance that it was a trap, they could probably fight their way out if they absolutely had to. It would mean a dead end, but that wouldn't stop them for long.

He elbow-crawled through the ventilation, listening to the gunfire in his earpiece and hearing Tony steadily calling out the number of enemies on the battlefield. If the number started going down, Bucky had to run. If the number rose too fast, they had underestimated Hydra, and they _both_ had to run. But so far, so good.

He turned left and came face-to-face with a very different room than he was expecting. "Stark, your information was a little bit off…"

"In what way?" The genius almost sounded personally affronted. Scratch that, he _did_ sound personally affronted. "Uh… are we in trouble?"

"Not exactly. This isn't a _research center_ , it's a fucking _prison_."

A few moments of hesitation. "They might mean the same thing to Hydra. Look, Barnes, much as I'd love to start a prison break, I think we'd better bail on this one. As soon as they think I might be getting in, they'll start killing anyone in there, right?"

"Right. Instead of wiping the hard drives to delete the evidence, they'd have to kill everyone. Standard Hydra procedure." He started moving through the ventilation again. Obviously there were no grates _inside_ the cells, so all he could see were guard's rooms and stone halls. Everything, though, was abnormally quiet.

Tony was talking again. "So, if you see a computer, we can at least get a prisoner transport list, maybe figure out where other prisons are. Other than that, though, you'd better get the hell out of there."

He could hear a lot of noise up ahead. Better to avoid that area, but he didn't have much choice. There weren't any turns, he'd have to wait until he found a fork in the ventilation system.

He peered through the next available grate, only to see another room he was _not_ expecting. "Oh, shit, I got here during lunch." His eyes scanned the hall automatically. No wonder the rest of the place had been so quiet, there simply hadn't been anyone there. "The noise will cover me, though, so there's that." His eyes darted from table to table, trying to figure out if any attention would be paid to a sudden noise.

"Are you good?"

"I'm good," he decided, and started off. He probably would have been a lot better at sneaking through the metal vents if he hadn't had a metal _arm._ As it was, he did make a little noise, though not as much as a normal person would have.

He counted seven vents on his path across the cafeteria, and each time he got a chance to look through one, he scanned the prisoners on his path to see if any of them were glancing around for the source of the noise. He doubted he could be heard, but better safe than sorry.

"I'm almost at the end of the cafeteria," he hissed. "What's the count at right now? How long do I have?"

"I'm starting to get a little worried," Tony admitted. "Can you get out in under fifteen minutes? We should still have a safety margin then."

"Can do," he answered, and reached the last vent before he got away from the crowded room. Reflexively, his eyes scanned the crowd one last time. Nobody was looking up at the ceiling, nobody was looking for him…

He was about to turn away when he noticed the man sitting directly under the vent. Tony's voice was still talking in his ear. "Right, I think I can draw them a little bit to the east, so the south exit should be pretty clear, but that won't last for long, you'll have to-"

"Tony, we have a situation." His voice was calm, but something in it must have seriously caught the inventor's attention, because the line went dead silent. "We can't leave yet."

"Are you for _real,_ Barnes? What the hell do you mean, we _can't leave_? We kind of have to, we can't risk sticking around for too long or I'm going to get shot full of holes and then you're going to get caught!" An exasperated sigh punctuated the sentence. "But you knew all that already, so please enlighten me: _why_ can't we leave yet?"

Bucky cleared his throat, letting his eyes take in a full profile of the man, checking and double-checking the stocky frame, the brown hair, the way he situated himself so he could see the whole room. He zeroed in on the mannerisms, checking again, but he was already perfectly sure.

"Because I just found Clint."


	13. Chapter 13

**A/N - I keep writing like a paragraph of this and then forgetting I didn't actually write a whole chapter. Lol. My bad.**

The archer looked like _shit._

It shouldn't have bothered Bucky - he was in the middle of a mission, in full "infiltration mode," concentrating completely on not getting caught.

It bothered him anyway.

The fact of the matter was, Bucky hadn't gotten the chance to know any of Steve's "team" very well, back when they were all trying to escape Ross… well, and Tony. Mostly Tony. After that, he had gone immediately into cryostasis, and from there had been taken by Hydra. So he didn't really _know_ any of them, except of course Steve.

In the short time he had spent with them, though, he'd felt something different about all of them. It took until a few weeks after they were separated for him to realize what it was: he genuinely _liked_ them, and Clint was one of the best. The archer had been settling into a normal life, then Steve had called, and suddenly he was right back in the thick of it. The few times he complained about deciding to follow Steve, it had been with a smile. Not to mention the fact that apparently Clint had no reservations about Bucky besides the obvious "is this guy going to kill me?" and had fully accepted Steve's decision to defend him.

Natasha had mentioned something similar happening between her and Clint, a "long time ago." That only raised his estimation of the archer. Sure, Steve was an _idiot_ for throwing his life on the line to defend Bucky, but hey, he still appreciated it. No wonder Clint and Natasha were close.

And now, Clint looked like absolute _shit._ Even in the dim lighting, Bucky could see the dark bruises marring every inch of exposed skin, and the blood matted in light brown hair. And damn it, it _affected him,_ not enough to make him make a mistake, but certainly enough to distract him.

Finally he realized not two seconds had gone by since he relayed the surprise to Tony, and the inventor was finally responding. " _Feathers is here? Like, right where you are? Why?"_

Bucky snorted. "Well, I wouldn't know, but I would hazard a guess that he was trying to find me and Hydra set a trap for him." He bit his lip. If Clint had been captured, chances were good that everyone else was in trouble as well. His eyes automatically scanned the room again. "Natasha isn't here." Even if she had dyed her unmistakable hair, there were no catlike assassins occupying the few spaces that Natasha would prefer to sit.

"This certainly puts a wrench in things." Tony's brain was obviously working at top speed, because he had that little hitch in his breath that only manifested itself when he felt challenged by a problem.

"What's the plan?" He already had an idea of what the genius was going to say, and while he didn't like it, at _all,_ it was probably the right decision.

Sure enough, the quiet words that came back were, "We can't stay. If we do, Hydra will kill me and capture you. We'll have to come back for him," he asserted, and the little hitch in his breath was back. "Get any information you can without them knowing you did, and get the hell out of there before someone hears you in the vents."

"Got it." Bucky hesitated, though, because he was only a few feet from Clint's head. "I can probably make contact without anyone else hearing me," he muttered, knowing already that his suggestion would be shot down.

And then it wasn't. "Go ahead," Tony replied. "If there's one thing I've learned about assassins, it's that they can do a hell of a lot with only a little information."

It was risky, but Tony appeared not to care. Or maybe he didn't think it was risky at all, knowing both assassins well, maybe he just trusted that they could avoid being discovered.

"Fifteen minutes, remember?" A clang of metal as a bullet struck the armor. "Then they'll realize I'm a distraction if I don't get out of here."

Instead of answering, Bucky leaned close to the grate, waited for a moment of relative quiet, and hissed words through his teeth. "Hawkeye, don't look now."

* * *

" _Hawkeye, don't look now."_ The words were so quiet that for a second Clint thought he might have imagined them. They also explained the feeling of being watched, the feeling that had been making the hairs on his neck stand up.

Slowly, he tilted his head to the side and waiting for another whisper.

" _I've got to get out of here, but we'll be coming back soon. Are the others here?"_ He gave his head the tiniest of shakes. " _Are they safe?"_ Another shake of the head. Well, Natasha wasn't safe, he couldn't be sure about the others, but there was no real way to relay that message with subtle head gestures.

Apparently, that was all the information necessary, because he faintly heard the scrape of metal on the metal vent and knew the man was already gone.

Barnes. It had to be, though his Brooklyn accent was stronger than any time Clint had heard him speak before. It just _figured._ Clint and Natasha had chased this guy halfway around the globe, and then when they had been captured, he _finally_ showed up. Of course.

Then again, Natasha had once told him that the only way to find an assassin was to sit still for a few days and wait for him or her to find you. Apparently that really was the best way to go about it.

When they were walked back to their cells, he heard someone talking about an attack on the front of the building, but they shut up quickly when they realized the prisoners were returning. Clint guessed that meant Steve or Wanda or one of the others had provided a distraction so that Barnes could get into the building. At least he had backup.

The only question was the plan. Did they even have a plan, or were they making this up as they went along? From the lack of information and time Barnes had had, it sure seemed like he was just winging it, but that wasn't the assassin's way, was it? Maybe it was Steve's doing.

Something was strange about the whole situation. Clint shrugged it off. He'd find out in due time, assuming rescue really was coming, and by that time hopefully Barnes and the rest would know where Natasha was.

Still, he resolved to be on guard. Just in case, as always. He was an Avenger, after all.

* * *

Tony felt like he'd been put through a meat grinder, but he was miraculously free of bullet holes. He'd pulled away the second Bucky was clear of the building, rocketing into the treeline and making absolutely sure he'd shaken all pursuit before he headed back to the helicopter.

"Are you hurt?" were the first words out of Bucky's mouth. The assassin himself looked completely unscathed, though he had dust in his black hair and dirt smudged across his face and clothing from the vents.

"Bruises. Maybe a cracked rib." Tony shrugged painfully and emerged from the armor. "None of their armor-piercing rounds made it, so today was a good day. What's the status on Clint and the prison list?"

Bucky gestured calmly to the table, where his black thumb drive was resting. "I copied all the transport files and covered my tracks like you told me. I just got back myself, so I haven't had a chance to look and see what's in there. Clint said that the others weren't with him, but that they weren't safe either. What's the plan?"

Tony pulled out his StarkPad, which he still couldn't believe Bucky had called a _phone tablet computer-y thing_ , and plugged in the thumb drive. "We find out just how many of our people Hydra has, find out where they are, and then I call in the heavy hitters to bust them out."

Bucky frowned in confusion. "I thought _we_ were the heavy hitters."

"Oh, we are, we are… but there are some people out there who hit even harder than us. One is in Namibia and probably wouldn't appreciate me intruding on his self-imposed exile, so I think I'll go with the other." He smirked. "So, let's see who we can find, yeah?"

The files were encrypted, of course. Hydra encrypted their information well, but hadn't exactly counted on Tony Stark himself trying to get at it. It only took half an hour.

"I'm not sure whether I should even be surprised that Steve managed to get himself into trouble again," grumbled Bucky when he realized Hydra had his best friend. "At least he and Natasha are together… but I don't recognize that location. Can't even pronounce it."

Tony chuckled and pulled out his tablet, searching for the town online. "It's actually in Canada, if you can believe that."

"So do you have a plan?" He was affronted that Barnes had even asked. He was Tony Stark, of course he had a plan.

A vibrant grin spread over the genius's face. "Like I said, the heavy hitters." He hit the third number on speed dial and listened to it ring. "I'm going to call in Vision."

"Hello." Vizh picked up on the second ring.

"Vizh, it's Tony," he said, but before he could continue he heard a gasp in the background. "...and not only did you answer on speakerphone, apparently, but you aren't alone. I would say 'my bad,' but I'm willing to bet that was Wanda..."

Bucky let out a snort and took the phone away from Tony. "Hi, Vision. Can I talk to Wanda please? We're in a tight spot and we sort of need backup."

"Barnes? Is that you? What the hell are you doing with Stark?"

Tony grabbed the phone back as soon as he heard that, and practically yelled, "What the hell are you doing with Vizh?"

"Probably not the same thing," Wanda replied, and Bucky dissolved into laughter. "Have you seen the others? Nobody was there the last time I went back to see them."

"Yeah… um…" Bucky stopped laughing immediately. "That's the bad news…"

As dire as their situation was, Tony spared exactly seven seconds to fume that Vizh had a secret love life before he explained the situation.

 **A/N - Much as I would** ** _rather_** **have Tony and Bucky doing everything together, I figured a Hydra prison camp designed to hold even superheroes would probably need more than 2 superheroes to stage a prison break.**

 **It's unfortunate, because I can tell I'm going to miss just having the two of them chilling together, but the plot demands backup and so backup they will have.**

 _ **Meanwhile,**_ **Vizh has a lot of explaining to do XD**


End file.
